The Church Mission Society (CMS), formerly known as the Church Missionary Society, is a British Anglican mission society working with Christians around the world. Founded in 1799, CMS has attracted over nine thousand men and women to serve as mission partners during its 200-year history. The society has also given its name "CMS" to a number of daughter organisations around the world, including Australia and New Zealand, which have now become independent.
The Bishop of Southwark is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Southwark in the Province of Canterbury.
Medical missions in China by Catholic and Protestant physicians and surgeons of the 19th and early 20th centuries laid many foundations for modern medicine in China. Western medical missionaries established the first modern clinics and hospitals, provided the first training for nurses, and opened the first medical schools in China. Work was also done in opposition to the abuse of opium. Medical treatment and care came to many Chinese who were addicted, and eventually public and official opinion was influenced in favor of bringing an end to the destructive trade. By 1901, China was the most popular destination for medical missionaries. The 150 foreign physicians operated 128 hospitals and 245 dispensaries, treating 1.7 million patients. In 1894, male medical missionaries comprised 14 percent of all missionaries; women doctors were four percent. Modern medical education in China started in the early 20th century at hospitals run by international missionaries.
Constance Watney, MBE, COC, SRN, MBCN, was a British born missionary nurse in Uganda.
The East African Revival was a movement of renewal in the Christian Church in East Africa during the late 1920s and 1930s. It began on a hill called Gahini in then Belgian Ruanda-Urundi in 1929, and spread to the eastern mountains of Belgian Congo, Uganda Protectorate, Tanganyika Territory and Kenya Colony during the 1930s and 1940s. The revival reshaped the Anglican Church already present in East Africa and contributed to its significant growth from the 1940s into the 1970s.
Herbert John Paterson CBE FRCS was a British surgeon and gastroenterologist.
Algernon “Algie” Stanley Smith was a British Protestant Christian missionary in Uganda and Ruanda.
John Howard Cook, M.S., F.R.C.S. was a British physician, missionary, lecturer, and disease consultant. With his brother he is known for the formation of the Mengo Hospital in Kampala, Uganda. Working alongside his brother, he carried his family's tradition of medical work overseas to Uganda where he focused on the surgical aspect of medical treatment. He spent 20 years spreading European medicine in Uganda and continued medical missionary service well beyond his years abroad.
John Edward Church, commonly referred to as Joe Church, was a British missionary who served with Church Mission Society (CMS). Dr. Joe Church served primarily in Rwanda and Uganda. He left England in 1927 and served as a missionary for 44 years, alternating between medical and evangelistic missions. He is widely known for playing a key role in the East African Revival. Additionally he served as a doctor in Rwanda for over a decade and constructed hospitals and a church. He has been recognized for his work by governments in East Africa and Europe.
Ian Aird was a Scottish surgeon who became Professor of Surgery at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in London. There he built up a large and productive research department which made particular contributions in cardiac surgery, renal transplantation and the association of blood groups with stomach cancer. He came to national and international prominence in 1953 when he led the teams which performed an operation to separate conjoined twins. His book A Companion in Surgical Studies was among the best selling surgical textbooks of its day. He died suddenly in 1962 at the age of 57.
William Burns Thomson was a Scottish medical missionary born in Kirriemuir, Scotland to Christian parents. Thomson dedicated his life to the spread of the gospel and to medical missionary work. His work as part of the Edinburgh Medical Missionary Society(EMMS) transformed the organization from its focus on the slums of Scotland to an international missionary aid organization. During his time with EMMS, Dr. Thomson advocated for missionaries across the globe, including Dr. Kaloost Vartan of the Nazareth Hospital and Dr. William Jackson Elmslie in Kashmir. Dr. Thomson also served as a pioneer for medical missionary training by creating the original EMMS training school at the Cowgate dispensary. This led to more training schools being created in other parts of the world, like Bombay(now known as Mumbai) and Calcutta(now known as Kolkata), India.
Edith Eleanor Newton was a British missionary part of the Church Missionary Society (CMS). She lived and worked in Palestine from October 1887 to October 1893 along with both of her sisters and fellow missionaries, Frances E. Newton and Constance A. Newton.
Gladys Maud Sandes Alston was an Irish surgeon and venereologist and the first woman surgeon at the London Lock Hospital in 1925. Inspired by Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, she became an active member of the medical community and published widely on venereal diseases like syphilis and the treatment of children after sexual assault.
Ernest Frederic Neve (1861-1946) was a British surgeon, Christian medical missionary, and author who provided medical care to the people of Kashmir and pioneered work on Kangri cancer. He established the Kashmir Mission Hospital and the Kashmir State Leper Hospital with his brother Arthur Neve and made significant contributions to the healthcare facilities in Kashmir throughout the over 50 years that he spent there.
Norman Cook was a British physician, medical missionary, and evangelist in Northern Nigeria from 1930 to 1933. As a member of the Hausa Band from Cambridge University, Cook was influential in the development of the hospitals and out-patient dispensaries in Zaria and Wusasa and was the leader in the building of the dispensary in Maska. His transfer of the leper colony in Zaria resulted the establishment of the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Training Centre in Zaria, Nigeria in 1991. Cook’s missionary service was brief due to his unexpected death caused by septicaemia in the operating theater.
Leonard E. S. Sharp was an English doctor and surgeon who served as a medical missionary in East Africa from 1914 to 1955. He worked in various regions across Uganda and modern-day Rwanda alongside his longtime professional partner and friend Algernon Stanley Smith. Together, the pair founded the Rwandan Mission and Sharp went on to establish a leper colony on Lake Bunyonyi. He received awards from the british queen Elizabeth II and the Royal African Society for his work.
Edward George Horder was an English medical missionary to China notable for his work with leprosy patients. As a member of the Church Missionary Society (C.M.S.), Horder spent 25 years in the city of Pakhoi–now Beihai–building and operating the first mission hospital in the Guangdong province. In addition to becoming the second-largest C.M.S. mission hospital in China, Horder's Pakhoi mission station was the first institution in the region to treat leprosy patients. Even after Horder's departure, the hospital remained a health center in Beihai and was the site of service for a generation of new missionaries. Although the leper wing closed in 1936, the hospital itself still survives as the Beihai People Hospital.
Gaskoin Richard Morden Wright was an English surgeon and missionary who founded the St Luke's Hospital of Nablus while he served with the Church Mission Society (CMS). St. Lukes Hospital remains the only charitable hospital in Nablus, Palestine as of 2022. Wright attended Surrey County School and St. Bartholomew's Teaching Hospital. He also published on the use of turpentine in gallstone disease. He was registered as a surgeon and physician in 1883. In 1890 he was accepted by the CMS working initially in Uganda. In October 1893, Wright went to Palestine, where he had his largest impact. Wright died in 1923 in Metheringham, Lincolnshire, England.
Leopold George Hill was an English medical missionary who worked as a member of the Church Mission Society (CMS) treating leprosy patients in Pakhoi, China. Hill was motivated to join missionary work by his religious upbringing and intended to treat his patients to not only recover physically but also gain a sense of religious purpose. He worked alongside his wife, Emma Amelia Hill, as well as with other fellow missionaries to continue the work of Dr. Edward Horder's establishment of the Pakhoi leper colony. After retiring from missionary service, Hill continued his contributions to CMS through administrative work as a Physician to the Society.
Elizabeth Mary Wells (1863–1918), also known as Elizabeth Hooper, was a Roman Catholic British physician and medical missionary. She worked for the Church Missionary Society in Equatorial East Africa, especially in Kahuhia and Jilore. In Kahuhia, she was instrumental in the long-lasting success of the hospital and served as the President at Kennaway Hall, leading the only training center for female missionaries at the time as well as leading two branch dispensaries. While in Jilore and Kahuhia, she dealt with a variety of medical conditions, primarily rheumatic gout, dysentery, and pneumonia.
